Rara F, an all-women's Rara band in Port-au-Prince, breaks the gender barrier to a delighted audience
Tequila Minsky, Heritagekonpa Magazine
This Women's Month of March, a most unusual theatrical performance took place in central Port-au-Prince at the cultural center FOKAL (Fondation Connaissance et Liberte). An all-women Rara band named Rara F, members of the women's feminist theatre group Atelier Toto B, gave a very experimental and daring performance to a packed auditorium.
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| Haitian women of the band Rara F are playing the Klewon (kone), a traditional Haitian Rara instrument ..Click here to Slide show |
The all-women's band played traditional Haitian drums with the flared, single-pitched klewon--also known as kone, long home-made trumpets, mixing theatre, Rara music and the experience of the public's reactions to the first ever all-women's Rara band. Previously, Rara F performed, as is the tradition, in the streets; on March 9 they performed on the FOKAL stage capturing the imagination of those in attendance.
Rara F proposes forms that can renew the Rara experience at large by injecting more theatre into it. They play with rhythms, onomatopoeia, dances, and songs, trying them on in a different register. Creating a new, modern language they use Vodou rhythms and traditional instruments while incorporating women's voices, their body language and their sensibilities.
Atelier Toto B initiated this experiment first for its own members, the women in the theatre group, hoping to help them master the Rara form and experiment with it to find new energy and break psychological barriers that would have people believe women cannot do certain things reserved for men. Atelier Toto B is under the artistic and administrative direction of Dieuvela Etienne and Manoucheca Ketan.
Rara, in general, is first of all a big collective spectacle where folk imagination and creativity can express itself in great exuberance. Traditionally male executed; men play instruments with women adding their voices. Rara F experiments with this spectacle from a women's point of view freeing women's expression while honoring and giving value to traditional folk forms.
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| Mastering the Rara form---women of the band Rara F play the traditional Haitian drums breaking psychological barriers that would have people believe women cannot do certain things reserved for men. ..Click here to Slide show |
In Haiti, the Rara season starts when carnival is over. Considered a Lenten festival, in fact, it is not just Catholic but incorporates many Vodou elements and the bands in Haiti consider themselves Vodou groups. Historically, Rara bands were primarily a rural tradition (carnival was urban), seen, on weekends, walking and playing on the country roads. Now, they’re equally as popular in Port-au-Prince. One of the music’s distinctions is the use of the one-toned bamboo trumpet, the vaksim, creating what seems to be an out-of tune sound but is really quite deliberate. Rara F uses the flared-metal single pitched klewon horn.
The 2003-built FOKAL Cultural Center in Port-au-Prince sponsors meetings, trainings, readings, debates, recreation and discovery. It comprises a public library, a cyber café, and a small auditorium designed for conferences, audio-visual presentations, films, concerts and theatre. Haitian and foreign painters, writers, and sculptors also exhibit or perform in the large atrium.
In the New York area, Haitian Rara bands can be seen when the weather warms at the southern end of Brooklyn's Prospect Park on Sundays. They also play in September’s West Indian Parade and participate in other cultural events.
